Review: Parks and Recreation - The Fourth Floor

(S02E11) Since it's December and it's time for all of those end of the year lists, can I just say that Aziz Ansari is one of my favorite people on television right now? Everything that he does as Tom Haverford is completely amazing, and every time he speaks, I just want more of him on the screen.

Even though I was dismayed to find out that Tom and Wendy have a Green Card marriage (I kind of wanted the creepy little dude to win just once and get the hot wife), I like how they've stretched out the storyline and have really made it into something interesting. It's been slow, but each time we see something about it, it's a nice little payoff. First we had the Halloween episode in which we saw, once again how adorable Tom and Wendy actually are together, along with first being introduced to the horrifying potential of a Wendy/Ron Swanson relationship.

I was actually taken a little off guard when their marriage ended with such little fanfare, but I like how they just snuck it in there and had Leslie find out by accident. However, the thing that caught me really off guard was learning to what extent Tom and Wendy were really faking their marriage. I don't know why, but I just assumed that since they had been married for so long that even though it was fake, there was some affection, so when Tom said that they had never even kissed, I felt really badly for the little guy.

This episode really made me reevaluate Tom and their marriage. Since he's hilarious, I would always be on Team Tom on this one, but even though she's a tall, beautiful surgeon, and he's just a short, beautiful government employee, Tom can do better. She had a dude over to their house the night they filed divorce papers. Fake marriage or not, that's just tacky.

In other relationship news, I'm still confused as to why the writers are still trying to make Mark and Ann happen. They are the most boring couple in the history of existence. I will say that I've grown to like Andy a lot more since he's been trying to break them up this season, but I'm done with it. In fact, I'd like to see more of the whole Andy/April thing that started. Them tossing the football around in the office for a few minutes was way more interesting than anything Mark and Ann have done the entire season. I like both of these characters, but this storyline is making them seem completely extraneous.

This is the first time I've ever seen this show....1. Amy Poehler looks sooo harsh in HD.....ick.2. That guy from Everwood has devolved into the worst actor ever on television. He was great as Bright...

Yes, Mark and Ann are a boring couple, and you hate them for their boringness, we've heard it for the umpteenth time now. Frankly, I think the point here is that they are supposed to be boring - they are pretty boring people to begin with. They are the straight man/woman to the comedy and hilarity around them. The sole purpose of the relationship is probably to bring out the funny in Andy, who I love almost as much as Tom Haverford now.

My problem with it is that they are both good actors who are being severely underutilized in this relationship. Being the straight man does not mean that they have to be boring. Rashida Jones was the straight man when she played Karen on The Office, but she was still an interesting character who added to the storylines instead of merely existing within them.

You hit the Mark/Ann vs. April/Andy thing right on the head. In the very first few episodes it seemed like they were gonna set him up to be kind of an asshole, but then he got together with Ann and just got boring. Now, neither of them ever do anything.

This was a good example of how the show can break out of the confines of a show about some local government offices. If every plot had to be about small time politics I think it would stagnate. I was also glad to see the cold open actually relate to and set up the main A-plot, instead of being an isolated throwaway joke.